A. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to the production of acrylonitrile from 4-cyano-suberonitrile.
B. The Prior Art
A long standing problem in the manufacture of adiponitrile from acrylonitrile by electrolytic dimerization has been the loss of adiponitrile by way of conversion to the by-products propionitrile and 4-cyano-suberonitrile, which, in a typical electrohydrodimerization reaction, occurs at a rate of about 8-14 mole % of the acrylonitrile employed at a starting material. Of this amount 4-7 mole % is attributable to losses involving conversion of acrylonitrile to the 4-cyano-suberonitrile.
Prior art efforts to recover these losses seem to have focused on the conversion of propionitrile to acrylonitrile; and little, if any attention was apparently given to recovery of acrylonitrile lost in the reactor through conversion to the 4-cyano-suberonitrile.
A reaction for converting the 4-cyano-suberonitrile to acrylonitrile at a commercially acceptable conversion and selectivity rate would be a significant advance in the art and is an object of this invention.